A Short and Concise Introduction to Ásatrú

I wrote a very short introduction to the Ásatrú faith for all who are interested in learning more about it. It is part of a general information portal about Ásatrú and Heathenry that I am putting together. It can be found here.

Faining-Galdor for the World of Wyrd

Hail, entire beam-work of the ancient roof of the sky;
Hail, Wyrd-spirit that penetratest from sky to earth,
From bright-homes above to dark-homes below,
And from the broad, plowed earth
Even into the midst of the Nine Worlds,
To the uttermost bounds of Ice-Hel.

Hail, Nornic spirit that fills me and shakest me...
That which shakes the branches of the Needle-Ash,
That which moved the great cow and the father of giants.

Hail, beginning and end of irremovable Nature:
Hail thou whose weaving moves the fire and rime,
The iron and stones, the winds and salty waters,
Those elements which untiringly render service
To the rightful order of All.

Hail, brightly shining Sun of Life,
Whose radiance gladly gifts warmth to all,
Hail, Moon shining from the night-roads
With a white face of fickle brilliance;
Hail all weal-wights of wind and sky,
Hail hap-wights of earth and rushing stream.

Hail great, great incomprehensible web of Wyrd,
Essence of the worlds, formed in a circle.
Hail to you, spinning and twisting in the unseen,
Having the form of water, of earth, of fire,
Of wind, of light, of darkness, of beast, God and man,
Star-glittering, damp-fiery-cold spirit.

As you be forever whole, we will fain know our wholeness.

The War for the West

PHOTO: A gang of patriarchal white racists from "The Lord of the Rings"

Are you ready? Strap in.


Racist Anti-Racists call Lord of the Rings "Too Eurocentric"

Here we go again- another case of me always being the last to know some things. Last night, I got a message through one of the many groups I belong to, which discussed the famous "Southern Poverty Law Center"- a group in Alabama that claims to be a "watchdog" for "hate groups."

In reality, as I have long known, but only now feel the need to say, the group itself is staffed from the top levels down by racist "anti-racist" African-Americans (formerly called "blacks" before the current tide of political correctness hit us.)

There was a time when I thought maybe the SPLC was doing some sort of good work as a watchdog organization- but as time has passed, I have become aware that their guiding ideology is nothing more than hatred of anything that casts Europeans or European-Americans (once called "whites" before the current tide of political correctness hit us) in a positive light, or celebrates the European and Western cultural values that have made our civilization as great as it is.

And the SPLC has rankled my last nerve by linking to an article that vilifies the Lord of the Rings trilogy- the recent hit movies made by Pete Jackson, based on J.R.R. Tolkien's great works- as "eurocentric", "patriarchal" and racist. They didn't do this recently; the article was written as the final movie in the trilogy was in theaters- but I didn't become aware of it until now. And well, when anger hits you, there's no time like the present!

In the past, I'd take a lot of crap without speaking up- the pervasive miasma of "White Man's Guilt" affected me like it affected most white males, owing to the programming I received at the hands of the media and the American radical left. But times, they are-a-changin', and they've been changing. My eyes are open now to what is happening in my life in a way they haven't been before.

This doesn't mean that I'm ready to start goose-stepping, but I am ready to say what I feel needs to be said, despite the fallout that may occur when the knuckle-dragging politically-correct morons catch a small wind of my rant.

Tolkien's Legacy

Let me start by saying that J.R.R. Tolkien's work was an amazing body of literature, winner of dozens of prestigious awards and declared by many in national polls to be the greatest work of fiction of the twentieth century. Although Tolkien was a devout Catholic, his knowledge of Old English and Anglo-Saxon literature and the mythologies of the Germanic peoples of Europe was profound (he was a philologist and professor, after all) and his work drew on some of the most enduring mythical and spiritual aesthetics that inform European civilization.

It is my complaint that his Christianity led him to create a world and worldview in which an over-simplistic and unqualified dualistic vision of "good vs. evil" exists (which in Tolkien almost always equates with "beautiful vs. ugly") instead of the more authentic Heathen worldview which underlies the mythologies- one where Gods and Giants do struggle against one another, representing forces of order and chaos, but with a clear notion that both sides are necessary to the cosmic wholeness and unfolding.

But we can overlook much when we look at the way Professor Tolkien's work regenerated so much latent power and imagination that was locked in the soul of the West! Thanks to his work, the entire field and genre of High Fantasy was born- bringing fresh imagination and enjoyment of its sacred realms to countless people.

To be fair, Tolkien's work has always had a bumpy reception- but the article linked by the SPLC crosses the line in a rather absurd way, in my view.

The Pale Patriarchal Penis People Strike Again

The article that inspired this response of mine was written by Andrea Lewis, a San Francisco based writer, who decided that the final installment of the Lord of the Rings trilogy- "The Return of the King" needed to be called "The Return of the Patriarchy."

I couldn't find the original article at "tolerance.org"- the laughable name of the SPLC website- (their search feature really sucks) but I was able to find it easily enough through a Google search at another "tolerance" related website here.

What problems did Ms. Lewis have with the movie? What could have inspired the SPLC to link to her? I'll let her speak for herself:

"The "Rings" films are like promotional ads for those tired old race and gender paradigms that were all the rage back in author J.R.R. Tolkien's day. Almost all of the heroes of the series are manly men who are whiter than white. They are frequently framed in halos of blinding bright light and exude a heavenly aura of all that is Eurocentric and good. Who but these courageous Anglo-Saxon souls can save Middle Earth from the dark and evil forces of the world?"

...Because you know, we can't have anything that seems too white or "Anglo-Saxon" being portrayed as heroic. Why, we'd be pushing a harmful "Heroic White Guy Stereotype"! And the last thing we want young white males today seeing is a movie that might put it in their heads that they, too, can be heroes, fighting for good causes, being self-sacrificing and brave.

Could those "old race and gender paradigms" have a role in why Western culture survived and succeeded as well as it did? I believe that anyone who digs deep enough- and isn't a devoted ideological and racist enemy of European-born cultures- will see that similar "paradigms of race and gender" have existed across the globe; the idea that other "races" were of lesser value or equality did not begin or end with European cultures- that attitude is found, historically, in Asia, Native America, and Africa, too, throughout all ages.

The notion of "gender roles" has seen a lot of variance, but again, Europe wasn't the only place women were expected (in many areas) to take on motherly roles, and to avoid fighting. Tolkien wasn't being racist when he wrote the world of Middle-Earth the way he did; he was being true to an authentic historical tradition, to add realism to his setting.


Ms. Lewis apparently takes the "war on white" so seriously that even white hair is a problem:

"On the good side, even the mighty wizard Gandalf the Grey (Ian McKellen) is sanitized and transformed from the weed-smoking, rather dingy figure we first meet in the "The Fellowship of the Ring," into Gandalf the White, who, by the time of "Return of the King," has become a powerful military leader complete with pure white hair and an Eisenhower attitude."

It's amusing to me that a man like Eisenhower, who risked his life leading armies to help overthrow a true racist menace like NAZI GERMANY, has a name that is now used by an ethnic woman as a slur. And it's especially amusing that Gandalf should be a more appealing character to her when he was "dingy and weed-smoking." White characters that are too clean-cut are a menace!


...But the Rainbow Coalition is Here To Save the Day

Ms. Lewis continues her racist manifesto/movie critique by introducing us to a movie and a trilogy that she does enjoy: The Matrix. Since this is the best part of her article, I'll have to let her explain why she likes it so much more:

"Say what you will about the convoluted storyline of the "Matrix" trilogy. At least those films give women and people of color some characters they can relate to.

From its earliest scenes, "The Matrix" flips mainstream Hollywood's minority representation manual on its head. A multi-cultural group of hackers dressed in black leather and sporting funky hairdos are our heroes; Secret Service-type "agents" in suits and ties are the bad guys. Neo, the trilogies' central figure, is played by mixed-race actor Keanu Reeves. His savior and mentor is Morpheus (Laurence Fishburne), a powerful leader who also happens to be a black man. The wisest figure in "The Matrix" is The Oracle, a warm and witty African American woman. The films are also infused with a strong sense of Asian style and culture, exemplified by the character Seraph (Collin Chou), the Oracle's protector, who is both a martial arts expert and Buddhist meditation practitioner.

...Most of the really bad guys in "The Matrix" are Eurotrash, including the very snobby Merovingian (Lambert Wilson) with his French accent, the dread-locked, very British albino twins (Neil and Adrian Rayment) and the Oracle's evil counterpart, The Architect, (Helmut Bakaitis), a rather stuffy and pompous white guy with white beard and white suit who reeks of imperialism."

The message is clear: so long as the villains are all white, and the heroes are black or multi-racial, we have a real festival of wholesome goodness on our hands! And it always helps to have a smooth Asian theme, to take the edge off of that oppressive Western feel.

From top to bottom, this woman makes it clear that any positive portrayal of Europeans or white people is not desirable. Black actors were cast in movies early in the 20th century and often totally presented as caricatures of real black people, and presented as oafish or undereducated or criminal, or just servants of whites- and I'm willing to bet that Ms. Lewis has screeched about the deeply ingrained racism of this fact somewhere in her other writings.

Apparently, the hate-card doesn't have two sides in Ms. Lewis' mind. If I had to guess, I'd guess that she believes that the historical wrongs of European and American cultures against other races and cultures now gives those others permission to engage in the same rampant racism and discrimination right back, to "balance the scales a bit".

Unfortunately for her, and for all of the racists like her, it doesn't work that way.

Ms. Lewis spends a good deal of time complaining that Lord of the Rings presented few strong female characters, and praising the Matrix for presenting lots of hot female ass-kickers- and I noticed that a woman's race is unimportant. She praises Carrie-Anne Moss (Trinity) for her role as a strong woman, even though Carrie-Anne Moss is certainly "whiter than white."

Lewis' war, it seems, is not just on white men, but on "patriarchy"- a catch term used to criticize deep patterns in European-born cultures these days, but which is a cultural feature found all over the world- very strongly in Asia, and also in Africa, where it has existed from the earliest of days. I'm not saying that "patriarchy is perfect"- but I am saying that the issue isn't so one-sided as radicals like to present, particularly not when they have their own agenda beneath it all. That agenda- held consciously and even unconsciously- is power- the same motivation they claim to hate in the "patriarchy."

The Will To Power

People reading me may wonder if I'm being a touch unfair. I don't see anything wrong with women or people of different ethnicities desiring to see strong, positive presentations of their own "kind". But must these presentations also accompany dismal presentations of other cultures or ethnicities? Why is the praise of one forever conflated with the detriment of another?

I think Nietzsche said it best when he discussed the "will to power" inside of cultures and even races- and individuals. When one person or group is repressed, their natural human will to power is not repressed; it simply seeks a new outlet. The capacity in human beings to twist and bend realities to suit their expression of power is amazing- our entire sense of "morality" in the west, he believed, was about that will to power emerging in ways that seem paradoxical.

I can't go into that here, but I can say with near metaphysical certainty that these "politically correct" movements are not movements that have everyone's best interests at heart. They have a certain, select group's best interests at heart- and that group is not the mainstream.

That group is the rag-tag union of all people who don't have the numbers and historical power to match the powerful mainstream, and their cries for "tolerance" (which are almost always a joke, bearing in mind their own personal intolerance) and their cries of "racism" and "insensitivity" are not as purely innocent as they seem.

These people are just as power-hungry and desirous of expressing their own personal power as the mainstream; they are every bit as racist and culturally elitist as the mainstream. There are no "good guys" in this game, just people who are better or worse at manipulating politics and opinions, stuck amid many people who are being marginalized for the crime of belonging to a majority group.

Why am I even making such a big deal out of this woman's article? Because an organization with the size and political power of the Southern Poverty Law Center linked to her and held her article up as representative of what sort of ideological thinking motivates them. The SPLC made this opinion piece into a piece of support for their perspectives and worldview, and that's when it came to my attention. And this is just the last in a long line of crap I've seen them pull, all in the name of "tolerance".

Their "tolerant world" has no place for white males like me. When I do well in life, it's not because I went to school and worked for years to get the good grades and advanced education I got- it's because I am riding on the back of the white male patriarchy that hands me the world. When a person from a non-white ethnicity does well, gets out and works, it's because they had drive, ambition, and bravery to face the deep hatred that the "man" has for them.

But no one handed me anything; I worked hard. Despite what these people think, there is no "white people club" out there, where all whites secretly share a bond of help and brotherhood. People with "white" skin have stood in my way on every level, in the pursuit of my goals. I'm just more competition for them, and for everyone.

World Culture War II

A deeper issue emerges here: what they call "culture war". That phrase means many things to many people, but now, I know what it means to me. Western culture- the culture designed and shaped by Europeans, in large part- is now marked for destruction, by forces outside of it, and by forces that are within it.

The forces that want to destroy it are not heroic avengers of "past wrongs"- they are not great "equalizers"- they are following the same blind urge to power that the "European villains" once followed to succeed as well as they did. They just aren't as good at it, outwardly, as Europeans were historically, so their tactics have intuitively evolved to continue the fight in a new form.

It's all the same thing- the justifications have just changed. There's a new tune of justification, a new battle-hymn, wrapped in notes of resilient sadness and the long-suffering "nobility" of the "downtrodden." The hymn sounds different, but it seeks to establish an empire all the same.

Some of the forces that now stalk the legacy of the West justify their assault in religious terms- they wish to replace the "Godless, satanic" West with true religion. The instruments are different, but the song remains the same.

In the same manner that the Pagan cultures of our Ancestors were undermined by forces from outside, but also by traitor converts from within, Western culture is being degraded in the same manner.

For me, this is not at all a racial issue- it is a cultural one. The people who still want to see this situation in terms of “race” are usually part of the problem. This is about something far greater than race- it’s about cultures of liberty versus cultures of tyranny, and both of those cultures contain many people of many different racial backgrounds.


The Old Crusaders went East; the New Crusaders come West

The force that threatens Western culture from the outside in these days is Islam; the forces that are within are people like Ms. Lewis, and the SPLC, and all of the radical left who, while enjoying the liberties that a bunch of dead white men bequeathed to them, seek to destroy the entire edifice, to replace it with one where they have power and authority. And their justification for this cultural genocide? The history of wrongs inflicted by some Westerners on others in the past.

When I was in my first year of college, I read "Sundiata: An Epic of Old Mali", the story of a king of Mali who had to journey across his land fighting against evil sorcerers and monsters, to regain his birthright. I really loved the book- in the (very African-African) hero Sundiata, I saw the nobility of the Hero archetype from many cultures. Race was never a consideration for me. I found the same thing when I read the Iliad, and when I read other books that contained eternal visions of heroes.

It never would have occurred to me to criticize the Epic of Sundiata because it was too "Afro-centric." Sundiata's "manliness" never offended me or bothered me. I didn't think of Sundiata in my head as "blacker than black" and make some leap to this being a bad thing. Why? Because I love the hero, whatever his color- he represents the wall of safety that stands between his people (or her people, for there are female heroes from even early mythologies) and the cultural destruction of their people. Because the book "Sundiata", like the "Iliad" or "Lord of the Rings" isn't about race. It's about culture and cultural conflict.

The political correct-o's will say that I'm an enfranchised white male who has only reaped the rewards of Western white culture, and never had to endure its negative backlash. But they'd be doing precisely what they accuse "racists" of doing- judging me by my appearance.

Some of ancestors- Irish and Sicilian- endured the scorn of Americans when they came to this country. The Irish particularly were mistreated, and died poor, overworked, and malnourished in many places. No one denies that Western societies (in common with all human societies) have historically contained elements of unfairness and inequality, or that they continue to do so, in ways.

But we are more than our history, and we always have been more than our history. Western culture cannot be measured solely on the basis of what some government policies at some times have been.

In the day and age where an African-American man sits on the throne of the President, we have to consider that Western culture contains more than just a difficult human history- it contains VALUES that are crucial to the survival of liberty in this world. It always contained those values, for they could not have emerged from nowhere, and they didn't just emerge during recent civil rights movements.

Thank the Pagans for Liberty

The days of the Greeks and Romans, and the Celtic and Germanic peoples gave us a few things that some might consider important: democracy, government by the representatives of the people, pluralism and cultural/religious tolerance as a social cornerstone, the root of humanism, limitations on the powers of kings, trial by jury, and (in the case of the Northern Europeans) a woman's right to divorce her husband at will. A few other pesky things like the origins of natural and physical sciences come to mind- as well as the medical profession.

The age of Christian rulers and the power of the Church was a setback- women did lose the liberties they had enjoyed before in many societies- they lost many freedoms, and I think it's fair to say that the sciences (especially medical science) did take quite a vacation because of the Church. Tolerance for other religions was also shot to nothing.

But that age- that dark age which was directly created and maintained by Christianity (despite what some want to claim) didn't last- it ended, and a rebirth happened: a rebirth of the same values and spirit of liberty and seeking inquiry that made Europe great originally.

And these values are still with us- even the dark power of organized religion couldn't destroy them or stamp them out for good, and the fringe lunatic protestants that flowed from the church (many of whom today still oppose science and pluralistic tolerance) can't stop them.

As a culture- we westerners- we believe in Liberty. Our women aren't placed under long drapes of cloth, not able to feel the sun or wind in their hair. Our women aren't socially (or actually) killed when they have sex outside of wedlock, or just happen to be raped without enough witnesses to prove that they weren't being "immoral".

Our women don't have to have their brothers or fathers to escort them around in public. Our women can drive cars. They can own businesses, property, and go to school as much and as long as they like. We aren't jailed for having pictures of naked women, or executed by hanging in public squares for being homosexual.

We don't slice people's hands off for stealing, nor do we execute women for "witchcraft". Thanks to the Chrisitan phase of our history, we once did some idiot things, but we outgrew it- we evolved- we had a cultural and secular “enlightenment” that Islamic culture is yet to have.

We can all state our opinions in public. We can have any religion we want, or no religion. We can read whatever we want, write whatever we want. Our leaders have massive checks and balances on their power, and our political offices change hands constantly, to stop any one person or group from getting power and keeping it. Policies that we don't like can be voted down, or voted out within a few years time.

Shock Speech

THIS is what the West has done for the world- it has stood for, and achieved, liberty. Liberty, like Justice, is a high-level virtue and dream that must be fought for, and it is a powerful struggle to maintain it. But we've done it. And every Westerner has a right to be proud- whether you can claim the founding fathers of the Western world as your genetic ancestors OR your cultural ancestors (or both) they are still your Forefathers, and their legacy is yours, too.

But Islamic culture would, at a moment's notice, see this all wiped away. I say "Islamic culture" because even in the so-called "liberal" Islamic nations, some or all of the horrors I listed above are prominent. This isn't just over-generalization. The political correct-o's love to say "Islam" and "Radical Islam", as though there was a difference- but all Islam is radical, when compared to the secular and liberty-loving West.

Muslim radicals are not the "fringe" of Islam. When most Americans hear of disasters in Muslim countries, they are appalled. Our government always offers aid. When 9/11 happened, Muslims worldwide danced in the streets- as a surprising spokesman will mention at the end of this article. Some people will try to qualify what I am saying here as hate speech, but it is far beyond such a simplistic thing.

It's shock speech; it's the shock that everyone should feel when they realize that Western culture is facing a foe, a fierce and determined cultural foe that does not share its belief in liberty, and the West isn't doing too well right now- partly because we've had our "white heroes" taken from us, and seen those same heroes called "racist" or "patriarchal". Tolkien's "Heroes of the West" are not just fixtures from his stories. They are an almost prophetic call to stand up for what the West means, before it is lost.

We need to stop allowing people to be shamed and insulted just because their forefathers were white and successful. This is not "racism"- this is my culturally-ingrained sense of pride and fairness talking. This is me demanding that I be treated for my own merits, not just the fact that I am a descendant of these great men.

There is no shame being a part of Western culture, and especially no shame in being genetically related to the people who originally created it. They made a luminous light for the whole world, and without them, this world would not be what it is. The value of liberty would not exist as it does now.

Gimli Speaks

John Rhys-Davies, the actor who played "Gimli" in the Lord of the Rings trilogy, risked his career to speak out against the threat posed by Islamic culture to the liberty-loving West. He was very brave to do so, and very right. I end this rant/article by quoting him, for he says it best.


"I BELIEVE in racial equality not racial discrimination. All I was commenting on was that there are cultural changes taking place in Europe that I consider to be unacceptable. The fact that a minister of the French government has to fly to Cairo to talk with one of the religious heads in one of the mosques to get his approval for a ban on headscarves can be seen in two ways. One, is how wonderfully culturally sensitive. The other, it seems to give an authority to a wholly unelected figure well outside Europe's jurisdiction.

I am really proud to be living in a society that accepts women as our equals, that accepts civilized discourse that allows people to hold different opinions without coming to any act of violence.

Here in America when that earthquake happened in Iran the reaction of everyone I knew was horror and dismay, the reaction of everyone when they heard that the old woman had been brought out alive long after they thought there was anyone there was absolute awe at the extraordinary capacity of the human spirit to survive. Contrast that with people jumping up and down and clapping at the 9/11 disaster in certain countries.

I don't think that Western society is opposed to Islamic society at all. I think a very important part of Islamic society is opposed to Western society. It is time that ordinary Muslims stood up to be counted.

...When we are prepared to overlook certain things because we don't want to rock the boat, this is wrong. The greatest act of racism is to expect that other people will not behave according to your values and standards. Yes, I am for dead, (traditional) white male culture. It's pretty damn good, pretty damn marvelous, pretty wonderful. That's not to exclude other cultures, but it's not to diminish mine."

Ule's Farmstead

Good day, sacred kindreds all:

I am helping a friend and kinsman to get through the process that we call "Heathen Formation"- the Idavoll Kindred's term for the process of being inducted into Heathen culture and gaining knowledge and insight into our way, before being formally inducted into a community of Heathens.

To help him, I've created another blog called "Ule's Farmstead". I mention it here because some of you may care to view the "perspective essays" that I am writing for him, as his Redesman or Advice-man, during this time of formation. You may consider it a full intro course into the basics of Asatru, as I know it and we know it.

The blog is here: Ule's Farmstead

And currently, two essays are up- one is about "Being True to the Gods" (that's the first one) and the most recent one is called "Faining: Righting and Rowning."

I hope all who are interested get some use out of them. I'm going to keep making posts here, too, of course. But a lot of my Heathen writing time will be going to the Farmstead for the next few months.

Raise the Horns!

Pagans of Principle: The Path of Heathen High-Mindedness

A while back, I shared a link to a story about revivalist Polytheists in Greece who were enduring the unsurprising scorn of the Greek Orthodox Church. A quote from that story is with me today- a Bishop of the Orthodox Church mentioned that a "few" of the Pagans were "Pagans of principle"- his words. The rest, he said, were more involved in the recension of the Old Ways for (basically) pageantry and pedantics.

Over a thousand years of being the undisputed masters of the spiritual destiny of the West has made most Christians of any stripe very condescending; this is nowhere more apparent than in the way most devoted Christians automatically assume that one cannot be truly and perfectly principled and moral (or even truly at peace) without Christianity.

I don't have to tell most of my readers this; they've likely already experienced this attitude in people firsthand. But what the Bishop said inspired me today; I've been thinking about what it truly means to be a "Pagan of principle", and I've been just as inspired by how the Heathen path as I know it allows modern people to be just that- truly principled people- with what I feel is the most historically grounded, realistic, and visceral "code of morality" out there today.

Most Asatruar follow some variant of what they call the "nine noble virtues"- and many times blessed be these virtues, and all who take them as friends and guides to everyday life! Those who do, without a doubt, are good, honest, courageous people motivated by noble goals. When one examines (along with the many great authors and researchers who have examined) the seeds of historical reality to see what the authentic Heathen "code for living" was, one gains quite a reward. The nine noble virtues- in their many forms- serve well to approximate it, particularly in the universal insistence on guest-friendliness and loyalty to kin.

But I've thought long and hard on the "root" of the nine noble virtues, and the roots of the honor and social codes of the Ancestors; it is easy to see, if one is prepared to see, how the true origin of our Ancestors' behaviors in life-situations is the ancient and powerful notion of High Mindedness.

Let there be no doubt or obscurity on the matter: our Ancestors, and therefore all of us, are the People of the Sun. We are the descendants of the Ir-men, the people of the Tyr-pillar, the people of the Great Tree, the people who sprang from the blood of humans and the spiritual power of Gods. The solar disc- the glaring eye of Odhinn's triumphant Eagle, represents the victory of consciousness over the dim and dark powers that would drag all order and beauty down to Ur-chaos.

While we live, we live with the consciousness of the Gods in us. After we die, the Godly form bestowed on us by Allfather and his brothers, guided by the light we have preserved in this life, lives on. No greatness or nobility is ever truly lost. While we live, we are in possession of a precious gift, the most ennobling and precious gift that any wight or sentient being can have.

And it is this gift- this solar consciousness which has within it the entire conscious pattern of the Nine Worlds, and the possibility of unfolding into a direct and complete consciousness of wholeness- which is the best power any being can boast of having. It is this light of Gods and Men that gives rise to the notion of "High Mindedness"- the true human being, the true "Heathen of principle" is beholden to nothing but the highest principle in the Raidho-order of reality: the principle of constructive and beautifying cooperation and preservation.

It is stitched in the weave of Fate that we human beings were meant to apply our Godly consciousness, our minds, to the path of cooperation with one another, as the Gods cooperate to create and maintain and defend the great work of the Nine Worlds. There is no room for doubt here; we are creators like the Gods, by virtue of our gifts, and furthermore, our gift is not for us alone, but something that can and must be shared- the human "high mind" of solar-awareness is meant to protect and beautify this world, our lives, the lives of others, and to preserve what is good.

Co-creativity and Co-operation are part and parcel of the same mystery. No society worth the name ever arose on the merits of one man or woman; no society ever thrived or survived on anything other than high-minded cooperation and preservation. We have an enormous creative power and potential, and few understand that this luminous field of possibility, smoldering inside of most, but illuminating others, is the radiant presence of Allfather's spirit, which is the spirit of the Gods.

You feel it when you sense and appreciate beauty; it is why we feel so at peace when we arrange our homes in tidy ways, with beautiful, meaningful things displayed proudly, and welcome guests in. It is why we strive to build our lives around beautiful displays of nature, and neat, safe neighborhoods. It is why we create and appreciate art, music, poetry, and the like.

People talk much of "proof" for the existence of Gods or the Godly spirit, but no person who has experienced the power of creativity and orderly, beautiful aesthetics need worry over such proof. One moves in the current of Man's Fate and moves towards Man's highest intended destiny when one appreciates the beautiful things in this world and in other people.

People sometimes ask me why the "animals" (meaning "non-human living creatures") don't have this "high mindedness"- and accuse me of being "anthropocentric"; and to those people, these days I answer: they have it because we have it, and we humans are natural consecrators: we can consecrate non-human living beings, bless them, share with them, preserve and protect them, all because of our gift. We are in a web of connection and interaction- the divine light burst through fully consciously in us; it now flows from place to place and fills the web. The question becomes: will you become a willing channel?

We were meant to share our power, our special abilities. To beautify this world, preserve its many lives and forces, and live in harmony, in balance with it and with one another. When we violate this innate, Fateful directive, we see the emergence of the ugly, the destructive, and the perilous. We see and feel the difference. We know the face of the vicious wicked; we know it all too well. Only the insane can't see it and recognize it for what it is.

If there was a definition of "insanity" that I could accept, it would come down to this simple but profound thing: it would include those who have lost (or never had) the ability to sense and feel the difference between what is ennobling and what is degrading; between what is truly, spiritually healthy and what is baneful. What I am discussing is a feeling, something deep inside that guides and shelters and protects. Something innate guides the healthy people of this world away from the violating powers and the scourge of the horrid and perilous; something makes most people naturally resist the shackles of the unjust and the oppressive.

I love to think of the powerful values of the Ancestors: to have open generosity and undaunted courage; to be steadfast in friendship and uncompromising in enmity when facing the destructive and the ugly; to be faithful to kin, to one's lord, and faithful in love- to have family pride and pride in the Ancestors, keeping Troth with the sacred powers... such high-minded values rest within the ancient Teutonic belief in inexorable Fate, and the need to endure the needful and unavoidable challenges that will arise to any who stands for such high and noble values.

As I said, for me, all of these values go back to "High Mindedness"- which means to climb the rays of Odhinn's Sun-like mind and to come to understand the nature of one's own internal illumination, and to realize that we can rise above the destructiveness and greed and peril that characterizes the state of Nature's raw, red talons and which characterizes the state of the Thursic powers that still course through the deep places of the world and the cosmos.

We humans are the blossoms of the MANNAZ mystery, the vessels of and participants in the work of the Gods in our own world, with a duty to spread the light of the possibilities of the High Mind to all things. We begin with ourselves, celebrating the victory of light in us, and from there, we radiate it like the sun radiates light to all the world.

This is what freedom is: to be free of the darkness of the Thursic worlds is to be free of the selfishness that would prevent us from being generous; to be free of the unconscious drives to destroy and dominate that would prevent us from being loyal to friends and self-sacrificing for the family and community; to be free of the ignorance that prevents us from seeing ourselves as parts of a greater whole, and part of an ancestral line, allowing us to see with wisdom how the Web of Wyrd contains us all and to be proud of the greater story of which we are a part. The solar mind of the great Eagle of Odhinn has given this freedom.

We can be merciful; we are free from the unforgiving law of the talon unless we have no other recourse to it for the good of all. We can be compassionate; we can be thoughtful; we can be open-minded to many sides of many issues, weighing with wisdom the merits of what confronts us in life; we can be patient and we can be better than the bulk of those who seek only insipid self-glorification and wealth at any cost. We can see entire societies in this world based on fear, not high-mindedness; it is an eternal truth that fear is the polar opposite of the solar-minded attitude.

We see entire societies based on fear of sexuality and prudish, (sometimes violent) unthinking adherence to the words of dead scriptures; we see entire societies where the value of human life- especially female human life- has all but been lost. The way of high-mindedness is the way of life's value. Life is the seat of the solar force; it is the "high seat" of every possibility of beauty and power- and thus, no "tradition", no matter how venerable, can justify the wanton destruction of life, injustice, or the imprisonment and mistreatment of entire genders or types of people. Those who fight against these sorts of injustices fight with the righteous wrath of the Aesir- they are the true spiritual princes and spear-disir of our times.

A person who can be free in this High-Minded way of being, and increase and preserve the beauty and harmony of this world, that person is the most principled human- none can claim to be more so. And none will have a more honored seat in the Halls of the Gods when the Fate of death finally sends them to the Hel-way and then to the Doom-ring.

I do not offer promises of reward in the afterlife as some incentive; the Ancestors did not, and I do not- I offer only the truth that each person who engages the High-Mindedness that is Man's greatest gift will make him or herself into a sun in this life, and that light will shine beyond the boundaries of this life, because that is what suns and stars do. Those who remain in darkness will have only the darkness of the self when death closes their eyes and all other lights have failed.

This is not "reward for services rendered or obedience tendered"- this is "prepare your destiny now through your nobility- or lack thereof." No white Christ will let you off the hook for your own darkness- and no true "life of principle" is possible for those who have not taken full responsibility for their own light.

For those who imagine our Ancestors to have been violent, brutish people who allowed only warriors fallen in the act of battle to go to Odhinn's drinking hall, think again: it is well proven- at least to my satisfaction- that the ancient Heathens believed that men who were slain in combat and who died with the bloodstains of atrocity on their hands did not merit Valhalla. Those interested further in this point should see Rydberg's "Teutonic Mythology" for more information and evidence. Now, as in the distant past, the heavens are reserved for the stars- light for the light, and darkness for the darkness.

May the Ginnregin keep you all very safe. Let your minds join Odhinn's great victory, and be one of the heroes who helps keep the world safe until the end of Worlds.

Follow unwaveringly the course of Raidho-beauty and Wunjo-life.

The Endless Land and the Fallen Age

The far north is calling, but I can't be there yet. Any journey worth the taking is long and burdensome. I have dropped sail, however, and with my family and Gods aside me, we have begun the long trek.

Our journey takes us through here, a landscape of endless forests and farmsteads fallen into half-abandonment and half-decay. This is the lay of our times: there was a dream once, that was America; all over the land, people gathered together in communities and believed that the dream would last forever, but it didn't. Their dreams were invested in their children, and those dreams, for the most part, grew up and left the tiny woods and broad fields on the side of the endless roads for cities and other destinations.

With the young gone, only the old were left to watch the world change, and change it did. entire hidden and downtrodden populations of people, once marginalized, gained their rights to a new freedom. The local networks of favoritism and nepotism died and broke apart and retired. Money changed in value, and then changed again. Services once needed were replaced by new technologies. Industries once prominent faded away. Now, boarded up homes and shadows alone remain, and I'm right in the middle of it all, lodging in a forest surrounded by neglect and sparsely populated dirt roads peopled by strangers.

The woods are wild; once, they were tamed by people on all sides. Once, goats ate the grass and low branches here; now, a tangle is everywhere. Once, cats climbed the rafters of the hand-made and raised wooden sheds and garages, but now, loose hunting dogs have killed them all. The goats vanished away, along with the chickens that were either killed by wild animals or their human masters, who could no longer afford to feed them. The chicken coops and roosts are rotted away and vine-covered. The fish pond has sunk into a murk, and goodness knows what lives in it now. The fence lines have vanished in huge gaps, and tangles of barbed wire are rolled up and rusted under ten year leaf piles.

But owls are here- and always have been. This lost region of forest was once named after the hooting owls that were prominent, and they have remained constant. They comfort me when they court and hunt at night. Something of my power hunts and courts with them. Their freedom and persistence is something of my own freedom.

It is a deplorable fate that made my road pass through here, but when the current waxing moon is full, and fades away, and waxes again to half, I will be gone, gone nearly to roof of the world. I have seen the mountains and forests that await there, in vision as well as with my own eyes. I have seen the snow and rivers, and felt the powers beckoning. I go with some risk behind me, but such as me and mine live in the hands of Wyrd and we fear no risk.

There are wights here, and they always have been here. They have grown wild themselves, alien to human beings, for the centuries of neglect that they have endured. They strike out and slay animals themselves at times. It is they that helped to bring waste to this community; all who ignore the spiritual powers that dwell in a place cannot expect to see their own families and legacies thrive in that place. On the hum of the hex-bridge, the mystery of the Helgrind, the mother of mysteries, I have dropped down and seen the landscape itself become only the crust covering a deeper power, and seen the wights moving across it.

Vaguely human shaped, I've seen them walking through the thick growth. I've seen how the falling buildings here have become haunted by them, as well as how the activities once carried out by people here have summoned powers- they are all creeping along unseen: they are grist and saw-meal; goat-hide and turned earth; blackened mound and holly edge, stone and sturdy beam, oak bark and pine-sap, resin fire and clay wight.

I have cut a small Ve-ditch in the earth, on cleared earth amid a grove of trees, to set apart a hallowed place for sacrifices. I have left a small way in opening to the east, and will fill the ditch with sacred spring water. When I sacrifice, it will be to these wild wights first, not so much for their friendship, but so that they will be satisfied to leave me and mine in peace, while we live and worship in their virid tangle, their pine-straw littered patch of thick wood. Then, my greatest grandfather Ing and his family will be given sacrifices, along with the high Thunderer, and of course The Master of Spirits and Sorcery- and always alongside the Disir and the mothers, and Earth, that greatest of mothers.

I have much to sacrifice for. Most people think of sacrifice in dim terms in these Godsless days, only framing it in Judeo-Christian terms, but our ancestral notion- ever more ancient- is far more sublime. It was the slaying- the sacrifice- of a great being- the mother/father of giants- at the dawn of the universe that made all things around me possible- from wights to the trees to the earth and sky: sacrifice is more than just the making holy of an offering, before it is slain and shared; sacrifice is about the creation of a new order. When I drag the bronze sacrificing knife crowned by a rough-hewn human head over the horn, symbolizing the slain ox of old, and fill a hlaut-bowl full of the dark ale that symbolizes blood, I am doing more than making a symbolic act of death and sharing; I am making a real act of creation, and it has power.

What the sacrifice blood touches is made new, in accordance with the will of the sacrificer. What place is sprinkled, what people and beings are sprinkled, they are made new. I want and need many things to be made new in my life, and the ancients have given me and mine a way to achieve that regeneration. Here, in the wight-haunted ruin of a tiny hamlet, as far from "civilization" as most people want to ever be, I will enact rites of timeless power.

Curse the "axial age" sages who decided that the ways of the ancestors were no longer "good enough" for the people- the axial age was the downfall of humanity, not the birth of a new humanity. From that cursed time came the scourge of Zoroastrianism, and from it, Judaism, with her two thrice-more accursed offspring Christianity and Islam. From it came Aristotle and Plato, who destroyed the true mystical and polytheistic heritage of Southern Europe, with their condescending "re-reading" and "reinterpretations" of the sacred myths of their people, and their scorn for the "superstitions", which were in fact luminous truths that their minds could not grasp. Our Greek cousins gave us the roots of the devastating "rationalism" that led to unqualified skepticism, atheism and corruption, and left many vulnerable to the rot of Christian missionaries.

In the east, world-hating religions arose, religions teaching how the world was suffering, fallen, and "transcendence" was needed, or the death of "ego", and the overcoming of desires, passions, and bodily hungers. From east to west the stink spread; in all these places, women were marginalized, packed into harems, under veils, and forced into submission and silence. Women were blamed for sin and death, and for being the seductresses that held men back from virtue.

The great civilizations of the pre-axial age accorded women their proper, sacred, and equal place; my own ancestors, I am proud to say, were such people. But the axial age was the turning of humans against the world and against women, out of fear and disgust and sorrow. They say humans in this era had become more aware of their mortality and frailty than ever before; from this fear was born what we call "religion" today.

The five regions that gave us the axial age- Iran, Greece, Palestine, India, and China, really did a fine job wrecking the world for the rest of us to be born later- but that is how curses work. They echo down through the generations of man like screams echo through canyons. By the time these screams fade, I fear, the ruin of the world will be upon us.

Why humanity waited until this particular "axial" period (800-200 BCE) to "break" and start turning like madmen against the primordial sanity of their ancestors, I don't know. But it did happen. It was a sign of the coming of the Wolf Age, the waning of the world. I have never succumbed to the madness; something strong in me- the love of the Hamingja-maiden who follows me through this life- sheltered me.

My senses were never lost; never did the wildness of nature or the spectacle of violence and death turn my stomach in fear and weaken my spirit. I am not afraid of death; as a living man, I am a part of this world, as a dead man, I will be part of it in another, more mysterious way, and I look forward to it. What sacredness now surrounds me is what always was and always will be, in countless forms. This is my life and my afterlife, and that is as Fate has woven. My Gods expected humans not to fear death, and anyone who knows the sacredness of nature and this world cannot fear death.

I lament the ruin wrought by the axial age madness, and it is more in focus for me now as I sit in a forest of waned hopes, dreams, and ruins. But a Wyrd-worker like me doesn't lament it long. Like the afternoon that falls high sun-tide, it had to happen. We can't change the world back, but each individual one of us can still live in the peace and sanity of the pre-axial age, in fellowship with the Gods and spirits. There is no greater peace, despite what the world-haters may say.

They claim that the axial-age religions and philosophies taught a revolutionary notion that people needed to "find truth" within themselves and break free of calcified traditions; they claim that the axial age was the birth-time of real virtue, as people finally reached a point where they had to look "within" to find compassion and virtue- but this is nonsense.

Virtue has always existed, and the terms "within" and "without" are shallow distinctions. There is no true "within" and "without"- all of the weave of Wyrd is one. Whatever you believe you are finding "within" yourself, is really a part of the whole, a part of this world, just as much "outside" you as it is perceptually "inside", and the same goes for whatever you believe is "outside" you. Humans started playing with their minds in new ways during the axial age, but virtue was not born. It is where it always was, in the wholeness. It lives as we live, as much a part of us and this world as anything else, for all time. The axial age was not an upward evolution; it was a disaster.

The world didn't have a spiritual revolution; humans had a narcissistic attack of "inwardness", mingled with potent fear and confusion, and we have all burned for it. The way people "found" truth and virtue before the axial age has an advantage over the new narcissism: it didn't destroy the world and hate women, and it didn't birth monstrous, judgmental, institutionalized religions that have corrupted society all the way to the level of government and spawned wars and destructive technologies beyond number.

They have crushed the remnants of the primal world, and taken a big shite on traditional wisdom, calling it (just like the Greek atheists) "superstition" and "marginal knowledge". They turned the word "myth" into a thing of stupidity and shame, but this is all only their perception. It is their curse. And it drinks the blood from us all.

I reject fully all of the "religions" and "spiritual paths" that teach that this world is bad or unsatisfactory; that men or women are corrupt, naturally and innately, on any level; that men or women must deny the body and senses to "rise above" earthly things, or any of that hogwash.

I reject fully any notion that people must shelter in some concept called "reason" or "rationality" in the face of obscurity and uncertainty and I further reject the notion that traditional pre-axial religions were superstitious, brutal savage attempts to grasp reality with made-up stories and bloody rites. This world and this existence is far beyond anything we can understand or believe, and the day the world-hating idiots recognize that, is the day that we may have a chance to breathe clean air until we all die. This story isn't over, and now, people are beginning to realize it. We can't lead the world back to sanity, but individual sanity is still a possibility.

Our cousins in Russia have heard the call as well, it seems:

Russian Pagans joyfully worship while the Orthodox Christians get pissed off

May Kupalo and Yarilo bless them powerfully. May old Volos be there as well, to shelter and protect them, with Perun alongside him. Welcome back, cousins. We are few but we are strong.

The Sacred Tree

All life is figured by them as a Tree. Igdrasil, the Ash-tree of existence, has its roots deep-down in the kingdoms of Death: its trunk reaches up heaven-high, spreads its boughs over the whole Universe: it is the Tree of Existence. At the foot of it, in the Death-Kingdom, sit the three Fates... watering its roots from the Sacred Well. It's "bough," with their buddings and disleafings, - events, things suffered, things done, catastrophes, - stretch through all lands and times. Is not every leaf of it a biography, every fiber there an act or word? Its boughs are the Histories of Nations. The rustle of it is the noise of Human Existence, onwards from of old. I find no similitude so true as this of a Tree. Beautiful; altogether beautiful and great.

-Thomas Carlyle