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This request was made by Cunnian for sleep/evening routine prayer:
If you want to submit a topic you would like me to write on for this blog or my Patreon, sign up for the Ansuz level or above here on my Patreon.
From Maleck comes this topic:
“Where do you draw the line between beginner/intermediate/advanced topics and practices? When is it appropriate to move from one to the other? Either forward or backwards?”
I went to look for when I last wrote about this, On The Need for Deeper Conversations. It feels buck wild to me that I wrote this two years ago. It feels a lot more recent than that!
In the comment section of the previous post Kaye said this:
“I don’t actually think the college metaphor works for the foundational stuff. It would make sense if the goal were to go to “college” and study, as it were, but a lot of people are not planning to do that. One of my big concerns is that we’re not welcoming enough to people without specialist interests, which is one reason for the attrition with second-gens, but it could also be a reason there isn’t more flow from spiritual-but-not-religious into polytheisms … it’s hard for a lot of people to see themselves in the communities when there are no models for what it looks like to be, let’s say, a car mechanic or nurse or second grade teacher who has a home shrine and goes to local rituals but has zero interest in specialist work beyond wanting to make sure that they’re seeing a competent divination specialist every now and then and getting house/apartment blessings and connecting with officiants for major life events. The esoteric/exoteric, specialist/practitioner bit makes way more sense here.”
One of my responses was:
“Your point on habit formation is also well-put. My kids don’t have to have specialized knowledge, they just have to carry out right relationship with the Gods insofar as what their roles and responsibilities are at their age, knowledge level, understanding, and what obligations they themselves show interest/engagement with. I will definitely agree with your point that for adults this is harder. In my own case, growing up Catholic, having to interrogate, deconstruct, work with, and where necessary ‘swap out’ the software, its an entire process my kids will never know, both having grown up Heathen. Being Heathen is just a part of how they understand the world.
Re the self-directed learning strategy is definitely what I am looking at with the 100-level and above stuff because that is where my focus lies as both a specialist and as a practitioner. Sometimes I need help parsing this language and nuance because I’ve been doing this so long that I can lose sight of it, if that makes sense! What is foundational in my mind and for me may not *actually* be foundational to polytheism. I definitely agree that your breakdown of self-study is what I am looking to foster with folks as the precursor to 100-level content, and maybe even 90-level content. The idea of collegiate level implies the necessary work prior to it from secondary school, primary school, and elementary education before it.”
In part, because of this conversation, it helped me modify the way I look at beginner/foundational topics and practices: they are similar to pre-college courses, with age-appropriate levels of topics, study, and engagement for folks at pre-adult age levels. I see the 100+ levels being for specialists and deeper dives on material, e.g. developing new cultus.
Beginner Topics
I see beginner topics and practice as foundational ones, and returning to them often is something I do. The basics of the cosmology, Who and What the Ginnreginn are, ways of relating to/with the Ginnreginn, the relationships established with the Ginnreginn, and maintaining right relationship are all examples of foundational topics and practice based in the beginner category. Teaching my children how to be Heathen has included all of this in different ways at different times.
As an example, this is the long version of our night prayer:
“Thank You Óðinn and Frigga for the world around us. Thank You Freyja for the love in our lives. Thank You Freyr and Gerða for the wonderful food. Thank You Loki, Angrboða, and Sigyn for laughter, protection, and perseverance. Thank You þórr and Síf for strength and generosity. Thank You Skaði and Ullr for hunting and survival. Thank You Heimdall for guarding the Gate. Thank You Sunna and Máni for the cycle of our days. Thank You Hela for the connection with our Dead. Thank You Brighid and Bres for inspiration and truth. Thank You Lykeios and Lupa for ferocity and kindness. Thank You Bast and Anubis for pleasure and Opening of the Ways. Thank You Sekhmet for Your fierceness. Thank You Djehuti for wisdom and magic. Thank You landvættir and húsvættir for our home. Thank You Ancestors for our lives. Be with us when we sleep. Ves þú heil. Be with us when we wake. Ves þú heil.”
The short version:
“Thank You Gods, Ancestors, and vættir for a good day. Be with us when we sleep. Ves þú heil. Be with us when we wake. Ves þú heil.”
Both of these prayers establish a very basic cosmology. In the long version of the night prayer we have accorded thanks for specific things that we understand of Them, through Them, and with Them that They have blessed us with, demonstrated in Their myths, and/or otherwise embody. The second prayer is fairly straightforward, and through both versions of our night prayers we are continuously establishing the good things in our lives come through the Gods, and hailing Them for being with us when we sleep and wake. The night prayers are a continuation and maintainer of relationship. It being a rote prayer not only helps with words when we are tired, it also establishes and maintains what our hearth cultus looks like, and is accessible to all the members of the family and any guests who are present and/or care to join us, regardless of age.
I think that accessibility is also emblematic of what beginner/foundational material needs to be. Intermediate and advanced topics will likely not make as much sense without the beginning material, and additional learning and work at that level. Intermediate and advanced topics may not be accessible to everyone even if the information present at each level is. Intermediate and advanced topics may have gatekeeping which can depend on what the particular requirements of a practice or topic are, any initiatory requirements, or specialized knowledge and experience one has to have in order to engage with it. As beginner topics and practice are the foundation of everything else, I continuously revisit it whether through the prayers (such as morning prayers, meal prayers, night prayers, prayers during struggle, etc.) or through simple spiritual hygiene (cleansing, grounding, centering, and shielding) exercises.
I do not see that magic itself is an intermediate or advanced topic. There are several forms of magic that are incredibly accessible at the beginner level that require only a basic understanding of cosmology and a basic understanding of the Sálættr, such as how to bring together one’s Will to enact change through Megin or Önd, and any ritual items that might be needed to perform a spell or maintain the desired magical effect. Creating taufr, a physical magical charm, can be as simple as carving a symbol into a given piece of wood, metal, plastic, etc. If you want to add some more souls to the taufr you can breathe on it (working with Önd), chant over it (kvæði), or sing a Rune over it while carving it (galdr). A simple candle spell can be a word, such as protection, written on a piece of paper and placed beneath or near the candle’s holder while it burns.
Intermediate Topics
Intermediate topics do more than merely build on the foundation. A lot of beginner topics themselves build on the foundations, such as blót, which is built on the basics of one’s worldview, is accessible to anyone, and to do well requires a solid understanding of why and how to conduct a ritual. Up to now I have avoided a word that I think summarizes a key difference to both intermediate and advanced from beginner topics: risk. Generally speaking, unless someone is intentionally being wildly inappropriate in a basic blót ritual, there is little risk to the practitioner or their communities. As we get into intermediate topics, the risk of harm to oneself and others as a result of your choice to pursue the given topic, increases.
As an example: seiðr, a topic that I can easily see float between intermediate and advanced depending on what the objective of the seiðr work is, which vættir are involved with it, and how the seiðr is engaged with. The risks to seiðr vs that of a simple candle cleansing are immense. A simple candle spell for protection generally involves just you, the eldrættr (fire spirit), and whomever the protection is being done for. The interaction with the eldrvættr can pose a risk, spiritually and physically, but they are much safer and less risky, spiritually speaking, than engaging with seiðr.
Seiðr requires not only a firm grasp of the beginner topics that undergird Heathenry, it also requires a knowledge of and experience in working with magic and vættir. It also requires the person to know what kind of seiðr they wish to engage in, e.g. if they wish to employ gandr, involve galdr, to -riða (‘ride’), and/or if the purpose of the seiðr is for divination purposes, aka spá. To do well and as safely as possible, seiðr also requires a keen sense of discernment on the part of the seiðmaðr, what vættir one wishes to involve in the seiðr, and how one wishes the seiðr to come about. Each additional factor can add another layer of complication and risk. Each additional factor presents a possible point of failure to the ritual if it is done poorly, incorrectly, or the vættir are unwilling to cooperate.
When it comes to esoteric work with Runes, I tend to see Runework starting off as intermediate. This is because you need to have a good grasp of the place they hold in modern Heathenry, what the historical sources do and do not say, study of the Runes Themselves, study of the Rune poems, and a keen sense of discernment whether one is working with the Runevættir for magic or divination. As with seiðr, I see the increasing presence of complexity and risk a good reason that it can cross into an advanced topic.
Advanced Topics
As the complexity, depth, and nuance required to usefully engage with a topic increases, usually alongside the risk when it comes to esoteric subjects, is where I see the line between intermediate and advanced topics. While seiðr may start out as just working with vættir to affect a desired change or maintain a state of being, as it grows in complexity, risk, and points of failure, I feel it crosses from intermediate to advanced. Given how risky gandr work can be, I would tend to see it as advanced. This also goes for any of the various -riða, such as kaldriða (cold-rider), trollrið (troll-rider, ‘riders of witchcraft’ per Price, p78) as it requires specialized knowledge and skill to hamfara, fare forth in one’s Hamr.
Risk is not the only factor, though, in whether I understand that a topic is advanced. It may require specialized knowledge, or especially, in my view, experience. The difference between someone getting started in Runework and someone who has experience in working with the Runes can be quite stark. The beginner in Runework is at an intermediate topic level because they need to have the foundation of the Heathen cosmology, how magic in it works, what vættir are, how Ørlög and Urðr work, and in what manners Runes may operate through and with both vættir and with/through/in Ørlög and Urðr prior to doing anything of substance with the Runevættir. Learning the names of the Runes, the poems, and ways in which to work with Them on a basic level are part of that intermediate exploration and learning. However, advanced topics, such as how to apply Runevættir for an effective healing ceremony, require knowledge, practical experience with the Runes, and an understanding of how to effectively work with Them. In short, advanced topics require wisdom.
Why bother with Intermediate and Advanced Topics?
With so many potential points of failure, why would a person even bother engage in seiðr should candle magic be more reliable? Why would we put more of our souls at risk to harm if all that was needed to heal would be to do a small prayer, make blót, and move on? Sometimes we need more. It might be that we need the ritual drama to believe that we are actually able to heal. I would not discount this, as this is itself a powerful factor. However, when intermediate and advanced topics are needing to be engaged with, I find it is often because the beginner topics are not at a sufficient depth or level of skill to handle it.
I hasten to point out that many, if not most Heathens, have no need to engage with intermediate and advanced topics, such as Runework or seiðr. Often what folks need on the everyday does not rise to that level of risk/reward, or sink to that level of need for the kind of intervention that seiðr or heavy Runework calls for. Beginner topics are not ‘baby’ topics, they are foundational and everyone, regardless of how little or how long they have been a Heathen, engages in and with them regularly. You do not just stop engaging with foundational Heathen topics unless you are completely setting aside Heathenry. Everyone who is a Heathen actually needs the beginner topics because they are key to practicing Heathenry and getting anywhere with a given intermediate or advanced topic.
The direct answer to the question in this section is that for many folks there is no need to dig deeper, soar higher, or go within with regards to any of the intermediate or advanced topics one could think of. It is entirely possible to live a gratifying, beautiful, well-informed, and well-experienced Heathen life without so much as exploring soul lore, touching the Runes, doing seiðr, engaging in gandir, or even making taufr. I think that, between the wellspring of interest in the topics, among many, that there is much to be gained by engaging with them, but there is certainly not a need to. That is, until there is a need for them.
Going Forward
So with my view firmly that we are consistently engaging with, and going back to beginner topics, what about going forward? When is it ideal to go forward with an intermediate topic?
I think if you have the drive, desire, or determination to learn about a given topic then it is a good time to explore it. I find that it is far better to engage with a topic on these terms than need. Looking at the Rune Poems for Nauðiz, generally glossed as ‘need’ or ‘constraint’, provides good reason for why:
Icelandic Rune Poem:
Constraint
grief of the bond-maid and state of oppression and toilsome work.
Norwegian Rune Poem:
Constraint gives scant choice; a naked man is chilled by the frost.
Anglo-Saxon Rune Poem:
Trouble is oppressive to the heart; yet often it proves a source of help and salvation to the children of men, to everyone who heeds it betimes.
By the time you need something you are going to want to be able to address the need or constraint. Far better to have studied, learned, experimented, and experienced prior to needing to. Since so many folks have divergent interests in Heathen spaces, it is likely that someone has done research and/or has practical experience in whatever topic you want to engage with. While not everyone needs to learn Runework, seiðr, how to make taufr, etc., there is enough potential need within the Heathen communities that even if your personal slice of the communities never makes use of what you learn on a given topic, someone in the greater communities will sooner or later. It is no waste to learn, to try, to experiment, to fail, to succeed, and to grow in wisdom.
Going Back
I experience going from advanced to intermediate topics when I refresh myself, come at the sources I have with new eyes, or try a new technique or book on the topic at hand. I will still pick up beginner books on working with the Runes because it is entirely possible I have missed something or just do not know a given technique. It also helps to be able to give informed critiques and recommendations! I still re-read books on Runic inscriptions, such as Terje Spurkland’s Norwegian Runes and Inscriptions. I have enjoyed Rune Hjarnø Rasmussen’s YouTube series on the Runes and still return to them. I am wrapping up working through The Norse Sorceress by Leszek Gardela, Sophie Bonding, and Peter Pentz. I have found it to be much like The Viking Way by Neil Price: it is a wonderful treasure trove of historical and archaeological information, exploration, and bringing together of diverse, and wonderful insights.
I hope that, if anyone takes anything from this, it is that we do not just stay in one mode with beginner, intermediate, and advanced material. We are, to borrow a term from conversations between Rune Hjarnø Rasmussen and Tyson Yunkaporter, dialoguing with the past, present, and future as surely with the topic at hand as with ourselves, and likewise, with and between our communities. We are co-creating Urðr with our past understanding and experiences in the present, and into the future, both individually and communally. So of course, I also see us as at least potentially shifting at times between beginner, intermediate, and advanced modes of operating depending on the circumstances at hand. There are some areas in which I do not have any expertise at all despite having experience with certain vættir, such as herbalism, in which I trust others to have the requisite knowledge and understanding. I am very much a beginner here, and only have so much energy to devote to learning and experiencing things. While I have a long and solid relationship with Ama Una, (Grandmother Joy), Mugwort, I am no herbalist. Mercifully, I not only do not need to know everything, I do not need to be an expert in everything. Thank the Ginnreginn for communities!
So much of this dialogue is taking place between spiritual specialists that it is important to keep in mind that most folks are exclusively, or mostly, practicing exoterically. That is, most folks are engaged in and with the outward-facing portions of the religions, while only a relative few are esoteric practitioners, folks who engage with a religion or practice’s hidden or specialized knowledge. Of those that are engaging in esoteric practices, even fewer are actually specialists of any stripe, and because our numbers are so few, many specialists have to wear multiple hats out of necessity to our calling, interests, and/or communities’ needs. The lines of what constitutes a beginner, intermediate, and advanced topic is in fairly consistent flux, and depends on the communities involved, and the expectations those communities hold. While dialogues like this one can open up how we talk about these things, and how we might look at them going forward, these are ultimately inter-and-intra-community dialogues. This post, and those like it, are one in a series of conversations that are hashed out between individuals, communities, and between our communities as folks join, grow, develop, look at old material with fresh eyes, learn wholly new information, have experiences, and bring what wisdom is theirs to bear.
If you want to submit a request for a prayer, poem, or song to be written to you privately or to be posted on this blog or my Patreon for a God, Ancestor, or spirit, sign up for the Ansuz and above level here on my Patreon.
This request was made by Maleck for Angrböða.
Trees range the mountains’ feet
Warmed in Everglow’s Light
Shining against the great grey heights
Dappling light shining through ancient leaves
Eldest of forests ring the rooted Bones
Full of the Járnvíðr Ættr
Howls and yips, snarls and snaps
Fill the warm Ironwood air
Hooves pound the ground
The dýr make their ways
Traveling the well-trod trails
The Earth breathes at their passing
In Your útiseta You know
The forests’ cycles and the skogsra’s voice
Ormr who slither and those who sleep
How the Urðr of Járnvíðr carves
Mighty is the Gyðja
That guides well in Wisdom
Whose blót brings bounty
To all who partake in them
Járnvíðr grows well from Your Hugr
Fjolkyngi and fróðleikr You bear with Your Megin
The ground swells and the Ættr grows
Heil under Your care
An addendum explaining terms:
Everglow is said to be the name that Jötnar call Sunna/Sól/the Sun in Alvíssmál. Járnvíðar is the Ironwood. Dýr translates to deer, more broadly animals like deer including elk, reindeer, deer, etc. Útiseta is sitting out, a spiritual practice of communing with vættir usually in a natural setting and/or underneath a cloak or similar covering. Gyðja is the feminine form of goði, meaning chieftain. Fjölkynngi or fjölkyngi is sorcery or magic. Fróðleikur is magical knowledge, as frœði are charms and /or magic. Blót means ritual generally sometimes involving sacrifice of some kind. Ættr means tribe, clan, or group. Skogsra or skogsrå are forest rulers, usually seen as female. Like the head vættr of a forest. Ormr are snakes, or dragons as in wyrms.
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From Cunnian comes this topic:
“Miasma theory. I struggle with not hating this because – while practical in a bronze age sort of way – dross happens and devaluing this essential phase of being seems problematic. And delegating lower-purity beings to deal with it for you seems more problematic. This ends up involved with the cleanness issue. (I think my solution is to accept that the dross is as holy as anything else but is at a dangerous phase when it must be handled carefully but that letting the shit roll downhill is wrong and attract more rather than less moral hazard. ) So I am kind of looking for perspective and troubleshooting on the whole knot.”
To get us started let us look at a basic idea of what miasma is. Baring the Aegis also goes over this here.
“Miasma (μίασμα) means “stain, defilement” or “the stain of guilt” in Greek. It is usually translated as “pollution” in English, although there is no concept in English that precisely corresponds to miasma. Miasma is a god-sent disease that is caused by a murder that has not been atoned for (with proper purification rituals). A miasma can fall upon an entire city when one man in that city is guilty of a murder and has not atoned for it. A miasma can infect everyone on board a ship if one man on that ship is guilty of murder.
Miasma can spread like a disease, and it seems to be the objectification of guilt.”
While I cannot make you not hate miasma as a concept or theory, I find it is very useful in explaining spiritual dross, dirtiness, and yes, even pollution. I think taking much of the morality out of it save where certain actions invite miasma in is a useful way of approaching it. Some tasks are just going to make you dirtier than others. This is true whether you are waking up from sleep and you are sweaty, using the bathroom, digging a trench, or slaughtering an animal. I would hope in any of these cases you are at the least washing your hands. That is what I look at most methods of removing miasma as: the spiritual equivalent of washing your hands.
Where I think miasma can get complicated is when it goes into the realm of a whole town paying for someone’s fuckup. The way I see this round peg squared, though, is that the failing is not merely a moral one of a single individual. When it comes to a town getting caught up in miasma, it is a failure of the town to keep itself clean, to take care of its people. When the whole of a town or city is caught up in the effects of miasma I generally see it is because of a systematic failure to address what needs addressing. The story in Mythology Unbound’s entry on miasma clearly demonstrates this idea:
“When Oedipus the King begins, the city of Thebes is infected with a miasma: a disease has fallen on the crops, the cattle are dying, a plague is raging through the land, and all the children are stillborn. The Oracle at Delphi proclaims that the miasma is caused by the unexpiated murder of Laius, the previous king. Apollo declares that the murderer is still living in Thebes and that he must be found and punished (either by banishment or death) in order for the miasma to come to an end.”
The systematic failure here is not just the murder of the previous king, it is because that murder is unexpiated. Through this example we can see a city coming to fall under miasma due to any number of failures. Justice not being done is part of keeping the city clean, which yes does have moral and spiritual dimensions as surely as hand-washing does for us, especially given how easy it is for disease to spread without it. Systematic injustice manifests as harm for its citizens, whether or not the citizens themselves are aware of it, and for that miasma to lift the injustices must be expiated.
For us as individuals or even as small communities, the divides we experience between mundanity and the sacred are rather easier to address. We wash our hands, we communicate and resolve differences, we seek to resolve conflict with one another, we cleanse with khernips or katharmos of another kind, or the equivalent for whatever our tradition(s) are. When these sources of pollution rise higher than that, whether in complexity, the power involved, or the number of people involved, we encounter issues like that of Oedipus.
I actually do not think accepting the dross itself as holy is the thing here. The ways we get dross on us, in other words how we get dirty, that may be holy, such as getting good sleep leading to communicative dreams, digging a trench for planting crops to make offerings, or slaughtering an animal for sacrifice. Then again, many of the ways we get dirty may be wholly mundane, such as getting sweaty from sleeping under covers, getting dirt under our nails from weeding the garden, or cleaning up after our animals so they stay healthy. Without cracking open what remains to us of the various Orphic and non-Orphic katharmos (purification), the way I relate to most of these methods of cleansing is akin to washing the hands or bathing the body. Indeed, at least some of the ways of dealing with miasma was to literally wash your hands.
For the most part I put aside moral issues or objections to miasma or dross. It just…happens. You live, so you get dirty. Unless you do something deeply morally objectionable like straight up murdering someone or helping someone to be murdered, or doing something monumentally disrespectful like intentionally defiling a sacred space, most of the issues from miasma can be cleared away with simple purifications. Rather than devaluing the dirty parts of life, the idea of miasma and cleaning it is actually encouraging us to be respectful of the holy, sacred, and the things we should approach in a clean way. It’s not that having dirt on your hands is morally impure, it’s just…dirty, and needs cleaning. It’s mundane. If we understand that there is a separation from mundanity and the sacred, and from what is unclean from clean, then this recognition is a both a consideration of respect for mundanity and the mundane, and the holy Beings and holy places.
If you want to submit a request for a prayer, poem, or song to be written to you privately or to be posted on this blog or my Patreon for a God, Ancestor, or spirit, sign up for the Ansuz and above level here on my Patreon.
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From Maleck comes this topic:
“Some gods, for example Dionysus, are noted to have retinue or courts of other spirits. Can you talk about your experiences with gods and their retinues, particularly if you’ve experienced gods without attestation of such in the lore having them?”
Much of my experiences with the retinue and courts of spirits that Gods hold are often off the map of what lore we have. Even for those retinue or courts of spirits that are attested, my experiences tend to be a bit afield from what can be understood through written sources. An example: except for a few modern folks who identify as maenads, we have only the written sources to explore them prior to modern experiences with them. My experience with Gods that have retinues and/or courts is that those retinues and courts alike serve different functions depending on the God and the reason for that retinue or court existing. Even those Gods whose courts or retinue seem to be the same tend to have sharp, important differences.
My experience with Dionysos’ retinue has been one of praise, of making the way for the God, and inviting others to join the ongoing throng. Save for Dionysos Himself, the retinue is generally made up of mortals. In my experience, this retinue is made up of the mortals who swore themselves to Him and/or the paths He laid down prior to their death. Sometimes this retinue exists to bring on the bacchic states of mind that allow for transformation, and others, they drive transformation and madness not unlike driving cattle. Appropriate, given the name archbokolos and bokolos for head or arch-priest and priest, with bokolos related to cow-herd. A bright contrast might be seen with processions these retinue carry out. I tend to associate the more bokolos-led retinue with praise and worship, whereas I associate the maenads with madness and transformation, particularly when the maenads lead, and in their mad fury, seek to rip Dionysos apart, a praising and sacrificing of the God that sweeps up all in their path into their fury.
My experience with Frigg’s Council could not be more different. Each are Goddesses unto Themselves, serving in Frigg’s Council in some way as a helpmeet. I tend to find Them as a whole rather calm. Among the Council are: Frigg Herself, Saga, Eír, Gefjon, Fulla, Sjofn, Lofn, Var, Vör, Syn, Hlin, Snotra, and Gná. Each carries some great megin with Them in Council and brings that to bear when needed. Where Dionysos’ retinue is wild, often screaming, fierce, and feral, I once heard a devotee call Frigg’s Council is like a board meeting for a CEO, and I think it is apt. She and Her retinue tend to be very to-the-point, business-like at times. Of Her Council I interact the most with Eír, as She and Menglöð are the ones I tend to pray to when healing requests come to me. Most of my experiences with Frigg’s Council lie with Eír and Frigg Herself rather than the assembled Council, though on the few times I have been in Their Presence it has been both delightful and awe-inspiring.
Óðinn’s retinue I have a bit more experience with, as I hold a cultus with The Wild Hunt, to which He is one of the heads. I have seen Him lead the Hunt, pass off the responsibility, and co-leads with various Gods. In all of them He and His retinue are wild, fierce, sometimes unhinged, and yet, at times, well-conducted. It makes sense, given one of His heiti is Harjan, one of the translations for it being Lord of Hosts. In a lot of ways His retinue here reminds me of Dionysos’. It can carry His ferocity, to be sure, but it can also carry His edge of implacability, and the march of thousands of doomed feet, hooves, and paws that have found new life in the retinue.
Óðinn’s court is a pretty big about-face from experiencing Him leading the Wild Hunt. Here, Hávi, the High One, and Fimbulþulr, Mighty Thulr, comes forward. A þulr or thulr is one who is knowledgeable and wise. When He is seated at Hliðskjalf, His High Seat, and has assembled His court and/or is in Council with the Æsir, He may retain that edge of ferocity and frenzy, yet I feel it tempered with cold reason, manipulation, diplomacy, tactics, and tact. He seems the most a Chieftain to me in this way, and here what is best for the Æsir rules the day whereas The Wild Hunt, at least when He leads it, seems to be an extension or imbued with His fury and frenzy.
My experience with Freyr’s retinue, the Revelry, I can only really guess at. Given the experiences Maleck has related about Them, I am fairly certain that I have interacted with Them. To my understanding They are more oriented around spreading His blessings from the lands of the Dead to the lands of Life. Not all are peaceful, cuddly Beings. After all, these are Beings that have come back from the land of the Dead. My feeling that the Álfar who accompany Freyr from His journey to and from the mound are powerful, regal figures who carry various megin of Their own relevant to the trials He faces on exiting Helheim or traversing back to life.
While all I have given here are snapshots of my experience, it is my hope to communicate the ideas of these retinues, courts, and councils. Especially when it comes the The Revelry, I do not have as much experience as others do, and many of my experiences with the retinue of The Wild Hunt are bound up in experiences that are personal and powerful. Perhaps another time I can do a deeper drill down into particular experiences with these various Gods and Their retinues, Councils, and Courts.
If you want to submit a request for a prayer, poem, or song to be written to you privately or to be posted on this blog or my Patreon for a God, Ancestor, or spirit, sign up for the Ansuz and above level here on my Patreon.
This request was made by Maleck for Freyr’s retinue, The Revelry.
I enjoy ContraPoints. Each video is a 1.5-3 hours deep exploration of topics on philosophy, ideas, politics, and humanity through candid reflections, deep monologues, excellent cinematography, and humor. I am about 30 minutes into Natalie Wynn’s latest video, which begins with a look at Twilight and its impact and discourse surrounding it on release, and then goes into its themes, the history of romance as a genre of novels, and what Twilight and this exploration causes her to reflect on with regards to femininity, romance, philosophy, desire, lust, yearning, and craving.
I am about 30 minutes in and if I do not put these thoughts down now I may lose them. What I find incredibly funny about this and also intensely frustrating, is that WordPress gave me an impromptu lesson on encountering and overcoming yearning. I had written a variation of the text before this very point, and somehow it was completely erased and when I backtracked with Ctrl+Z and the undo feature here on the app, there was nothing of it that remained.
I then immediately understood why we yearned. My words, which had seemed concrete just a moment before, evaporated and would not return. What was more, as though to twist the knife, all that remained on my clipboard (I select all and copy frequently enough as a precaution that I can sometimes find what I have written there), the only fucking thing at all that copied? The word ‘desire’. In lowercase.
Mother. Fucker.
At this point in the video (around 32 minutes), Natalie has used the very straightforward question of “Have you ever yearned?” to explore ways that we desire things. Following this is a clip from Seinfeld where Kramer asks George if he has ever yearned, and the latter says he has craved but it has been a long time since he yearned. She uses this to make the point that yearning differs from craving. We crave things like a good sandwich, sex, or a book, and we can satisfy them. As she puts it, yearning is based in Love (Eros) with Shakespeare’s Sonnet 147 as an example, and that craving is based in Lust with Shakespeare’s Sonnet 129 as an example. We yearn for union with our loved ones, God/s (she uses the example of Psalm 63 with the NIV translation), to feel whole again or through oneness.
Nostalgia, Wynn notes, is a kind of yearning for lost time. Which is one of the key reasons it features so hard in Romanticism and fascism and its inverse with The Rapture in Christian Evangelicalism or its atheist double with Leftists and The Revolution, or Fully Automated Space Communism with…well, communists. Cravings can be momentarily satsified, whereas yearning cannot. Quoting Wynn, “You yearn for the good old days because you lack them. They are lost time.”
She then goes on to talk about its use in advertising and how the use the unobtainable, of beauty and ideas use this yearning against us.
So much of what I have already seen is immediately applicable to my time in the Heathen communities. I see the same use of yearning Wynn points out that is used in advertising in the Heathen communities as well, and it is not just the AFA and Irminfolk Kindred types who deploy this. It is also heavily used by folks who cling to reconstruction as though it is actually a separate religious pathway rather than a methodology available to everyone, because that yearning for what was is so strong that it overrides the very real Heathenry we all have to live here and now. It is why I am so happy to see older guard Heathens like Ben Waggoner declare that we need to bring Heathenry out of the book and into the lab of learned, living experience. By breaking this cycle of yearning for a golden age or for living in history, we enable ourselves to better reach for the futures available to us without its yolk.
By breaking the cycle of yearning through nostalgia for a long-gone past, or at least doing our best to, we allow Heathenry to breathe and develop in its own time and place. By allowing history to inform, but not being beholden to it, we avoid becoming fossilized with ideas of how we could or ought to be, and we encourage and secure the building of living traditions. Through building Heathenry up through living tradition we take the ideas we hold into the way we live communally and individually. I do not expect we will ever be wholly free of yearning, so I would rather we channel nostalgia into creativity, building things, and integrate them as part of our traditions so the objects of our nostalgia live alongside us rather than controlling us. We worship, revere, and work with our Ancestors in a variety of ways, and this is one more way we can do so.
As Wynn points out, both Buddhist philosophy and Stoics speak on yearning and suffering. Buddhism speaks to this first through its Four Noble Truths. Two sources I have found are here and here. A brief summary from LearnReligion: The First accepts that all life includes suffering, the Second that desire is the cause of suffering, the Third that suffering is overcome by letting go of desire, and the Fourth is to walk the Eightfold Path. Stoics, meanwhile advise to yearn only for what may be controlled or in other words, to desire in ways that can be controlled. An exploration of this can be found here and here. This leads me to thinking on a Heathen way or ways we may consider sufferings and desire.
Quoting The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy:
Hadot (1998) draws a series of parallels between the four virtues, the three topoi and what are referred to as the three Stoic disciplines: desire, action, and assent. The discipline of desire, sometimes referred to as Stoic acceptance, is derived from the study of physics, and in particular from the idea of universal cause and effect. It consists in training oneself to desire what the universe allows and not to pursue what it does not allow. A famous metaphor here, used by Epictetus, is that of a dog leashed to a cart: the dog can either fight the cart’s movement at every inch, thus hurting himself and ending up miserable; or he can decide to gingerly go along with the ride and enjoy the panorama. This is a version of what Nietzsche eventually called amor fati (love your fate), and that is encapsulated in Epictetus’ phrase “endure [what the universe throws your way] and renounce [what the universe does not allow]” (Fragments 10). Consequently, according to Hadot, the discipline of desire is linked to the virtues of courage (to follow the order of the cosmos) and temperance (to be able to control one’s desires).
The idea of enduring and loving your fate also rings something true for me in my Heathen approach to life. This is not a tacit acceptance with regards to a Heathen approach, and I do not garner this understanding of tacit acceptance or resignation from reading Stoics either when it comes to endurance and loving your fate. It should be noted that the discipline of desire is linked to the virtue of courage, not a resignation. It is about living life to its fullest within the confines of the leash’s length and cart’s destination. What is within our spheres of influence to affect and be affected by is governed by the cart, the leash, and beyond that our own talents, skills, abilities, and inclinations.
Suffering is ultimately unavoidable. We live, so we die. We live, so we will encounter suffering. Rough times hit all of us no matter how insulated from them we are. How we approach suffering depends on what has come before us, our Ørlǫg, that shapes our thread or line in the tapestry/stone, Urðr, that we are weaving/carving, that we are co-creating alongside the Ginnreginn. How we approach suffering depends on how the various souls we have respond and act within this tapestry/stone. This perspective is aided because I do not experience nor understand this world through the well-worn metaphor of it being a Vale of Tears. Heathenry’s lack of a world-denying or vilifying component necessary to such a theology, especially to treat Miðgarðr as a realm predominantly of suffering and woe, places no special pressure to act or behave certain ways on Heathens.
The opening of possibility means that not only can our approaches to suffering and endurance vary, it also means that there is no single or select special spectrum of correct ways to endure. This opens up our approaches to fate, and the ways we may endure, even celebrate, what we suffer. The dog straining and fighting against his leash in the example by Epictetus is a viable option, one that can result in his misery, but is nonetheless viable and may be correct for that dog. Per his nature, his path, or his choice, he may be unable or unwilling to act another way.
By approaching suffering in this expansive way Heathens may approach yearning, craving, and desire more broadly in a wider array of approaches than what is approved through the over-culture. It means that things such as mistakes, missteps, and harmful choices fall out of the realm of a strictly theologically-categorized moral failing (eg sin in Christianity) and condemnation. These approaches have immense affect in how we conduct ourselves in life. This is true whether it is how we approach ideas of justice or those of recovery.
When understood through the Heathen lens of endurance, addiction is not a moral failing, but a potentially harmful method of enduring. A way of understanding it through the lens of endurance can be that the yearning/craving cycle of desire has turned into a feedback loop, so that the yearning for something unable to be satisfied is endured through smaller, regularly satisfiable urges. In its more benign forms, such as caffeine addiction, the yearning for excitement and so, the craving for stimulation, may be satisfied by drinking coffee, pop, or tea. In its less benign forms, the yearning through nostalgia we can feel for ‘the good old days’ when things were easier or prior to trauma may be blunted through the medium of the addiction, satisfying the craving the body has for the states it produces.
With this absence of treating addiction as a moral failing and the damnation of a person’s body and soul, a wider array of approaches to both addiction itself, and recovery, emerge. By casting aside a black and white morality found in the Christian and Christian-influenced over-culture’s in pursuit of one in which suffering is engaged with in more empathetic ways, recovery has more ways of being understood, expressed, pursued, and gained. A black-and-white view of alcohol and narcotics, and also of recovery, as expressed through bodies such as AA and NA, treat these things are zero-sum games. You are either sober or you are not. With the lens of endurance, recovery and sobriety is also free of its moral trapping as found in the Christian hegemony. Various roads, as opposed to only one straight and narrow one, become available to those in recovery. Various ways of being sober, engaging with sobriety, and treating addiction, become viable ways of approach because the absolutist moral imperative is lifted in favor of doing what is most sensible to endure, and with what is within the person’s capacity to live as well as they are able.
When I look at suffering and endurance it leads me to think on justice through the lens of Heathenry, and much of the way that criminality is expressed and conducted in the over-culture falls away. When I ask “What is a Heathen approach to justice and criminality?” I come back with a few answers. Some of these are informed by my personal politics as an ecosocialist whose politics are often based in consequentialist ethics rather than based in virtue or Kantian ethics. An example: if something poisons the water or destroys the land, then whether a person virtuously is doing so, if such a thing ever could be done, is a moot point. It is wrong because it does lasting, ongoing harm to the land, to the water, themselves as people, and to all who live in, with, and around them.
Crime is a legal term, meaning ‘behavior that is punishable as a public offense’. Ideally, an act that does ongoing harm to the land or water would be criminal, though it is clear by looking at Line 5’s ongoing operation this is not the case. This view of justice and criminality is intertwined with my Heathen worldview because, an an animist and polytheist, I believe the land and water, to name a few, are Beings unto Themselves. So, They deserve justice and must be considered from an ethical and legal perspective.
My understanding of justice from a Heathen perspective reframes crime and criminality from only a personal moral failing as it exists in our current legal system to questions of what, institutionally and societally, leads people to commit crime. That includes the personal existence of a sálættr (soul tribe/clan/group) and the ongoing effects of Hamingja (group luck/power which is both inherited from the Ancestors and passed on) intertwined with understanding everyone having Ørlög and being tied to Urðr on both a personal and communal level. I understand that this is not a view shared by the overculture or even many Pagans, so universalizing this idea is not the point here. How I construct my ideas of justice, however, is impacted by these ideas and my understanding of them.
If suffering is a necessity of life and if we desire to reduce suffering then I understand it to be ideal, just, to minimize it to ourselves and the environment we live within. There is no ‘out there’ to throw garbage to, no ‘out there’ to dipose waste into. In the Heathen worldview ‘out there’ is as likely to be a God, Ancestor, and/or vaettr (or full of vaettir) as it is an abstract ‘away from here’. Mass pollution, industrialization, and similar means destroys habitat whoever inhabits it and wastes resources from those places. If we are to have industrial work then it should be done with the least harm possible to the land, sea, sky, and other Beings. If we are to have mass movements of people, goods, and services, it should be done in a way that reduces suffering for all involved and does the most good for the most amount of people.
The yearning many Heathens express for community, for understanding and building good relationships with our Ginnreginn can all be good, even necessary things for us to explore and develop in for our communities to become more whole, more mature. Heathenry has spent a long time yearning for a romanticized past that has done ongoing harm to those outside the Heathen communities, and to the Heathen communities themselves. By healthily exploring and encouraging yearning, such as connecting with our communities, our Ginnreginn, or our sálættr, and de-emphasizing the yearning for a romanticized past that never really was, we can better grow and develop our communities. By willfully confronting our sources of negative craving and yearning, whether those be driven by algorithms, physical desires, emotional highs, or societal pressures, we can grow a more settled set of Heathen communities that can develop well now and into the future. By setting aside nostalgia and and allowing history to be a guide rather than an arbiter of our communities, then our communities, our religions, and spiritual lives may grow more healthy, whole, and heilagr. By putting aside the idea of a Golden Age and the Big Man theory we allow ourselves to live, now, in the ways that are best for us and our communities, and in turn, Heathenry benefits because it is living in concert, co-creating, carving and weaving Urðr, between us and the Ginnreginn. By embracing what is ours to carve or weave, to co-create, we embrace what suffering is ours, and in the same we can better embrace the joy and satisfaction of a well-lived life.
Perhaps more than anything, modern Heathenry is struggling to build cultures. I use the word “cultures” because I do not believe we are developing in one single way, nor do I think it would be helpful or ultimately possible to guide our development in such a way. Many of the discussions, such as the one I just wrote around suffering, joy, yearning, as well as others regarding our history, aesthetics, and what we are seeking to build, leads me to think on these things. So does my ongoing reading in Indigenous Healing Psychology.
I appreciate Cambridge Dictionary’s definition of culture, which will suit our needs: “the way of life, especially the general customs and beliefs, of a particular group of people at a particular time”.
Heathenry as a whole has been around in its modern iterations since the 70s, and, in many respects since that time, has come a long way from its racist and Romanticist past. While a comprehensive overview of Heathenry’s past is beyond the scope of this post and blog, I heavily recommend folks check out The Heathen History podcast for both its thoroughness and perspective. If you prefer to read, The Troth has a timeline here as well.
There is no question there is a lot of work to do within Heathenry to make the religion as a whole more inclusive. We are, however, at a point in time where distinctive Heathen religions and cultures are making themselves known. Since The Troth and the AFA definitively went their separate ways, the divides between them have deepened significantly. Where The Troth has embraced inclusivity in a variety of ways, the Asatru Folk Assembly has wholeheartedly embraced white supremacy. It is also important to note the general direction of The Troth and the AFA are in different areas: under the law and in their organizing, The Troth is a religious organization whereas the AFA is a church. This is a major component to understanding when it comes to how the modern Troth operates, and why many critiques of the organization’s structure fundamentally do not work.
In short, The Troth is not going to be the organization that produces a culture unto itself, save in a kind of reflection of greater trends within the inclusive Heathens that make it up. Distinct voices have made an impact in both the general membership and in leadership roles. In recent times, Urglaawe has emerged as a distinct Heathen voice and path, with Rob Schreiwer having served a term as the Steer of the Troth. What has come forward since Lauren Crow took the helm has been, in my view, the largest professionalization and updating of The Troth both in terms of its structure and its leadership. Not only have policy updates come forward that are intentionally inclusive with regards to race, ethnicity, neurodivergence, ability, and sobriety, the range of Gods that are willingly celebrated within Trothmoot gatherings has been expanded to be fully inclusive of those its membership actively worships. In other words, all of the Gods, including Loki, His Children, and Jötnar generally, who had been excluded from Trothmoot previously.
The Troth as it exists now is not actually here to build culture, per se. That would be the purview of the various Kindreds, tribes, groups, and individuals that make up the membership of the organization. I would argue that Urglaawe, with its basis in Pennsylvania Dutch culture, its own Runelore, Gods, and magical practices, qualifies as a distinct Heathen culture which has emerged in the recent past. There are regional forms of Heathenry making themselves known now, where an emphasis in terms of how the Ginnreginn are worshipped, understood, and related to, are reified through one’s locale rather than primarily or exclusively through an ancient Icelandic, Norwegian, Germanic, Saxon, or Anglish lens. If anything, given its structure and how it has developed over time, The Troth is a reflection of Heathen culture writ large by its membership.
Why does this matter? Because one of the many issues I have read/seen/heard that folks cite with The Troth is that it does not do more to speak on issues of note, on causes that are near and dear to many independent Heathens, and those within The Troth. As the largest inclusive Heathen organization, The Troth has a wide swathe of membership, bylaws to follow, and structure to adhere to. If you want leadership to shoot its mouth off or to act quickly without oversight, thought, or input, the examples of The Asatru Community, aka TAC, and Awaken the North are available. Not only was vetting poor in these communities, it was swiftly overrun with racists and their enablers. While The Troth has made missteps, mistakes, and outright fuck-ups, it has rededicated itself several times over the course of its life, righted the ship as best it could, and continued to be a true institution in communities where there are precious few, let alone inclusive ones.
So if I am not a member of The Troth as a culture building exercise, why bother with it? Because The Troth is both a reflection of and reinforcer of the cultures of those within it, and I would far rather bring The Troth left by being in it, raising my voice, and causing change from inside of it than to be outside of it. While The Troth is not here to build culture on its own, it does affect it. It is the most visible, largest, and inclusive international Heathen organization. It does work in mental health institutions and prisons, a needed counter to the AFA and other white supremacist groups. Its existence makes an impact on the cultures in Heathenry, and in turn, it is impacted by the culture of those within it. Being present in such an organization matters.
A big stumbling block to building culture, in my view, is the ideological purity requirements many bring with them to Heathenry. The ideological purity requirements of some folks in modern Pagan and Heathen circles seems to me to be born out of a sense of justice, anxiety, or a desire to be ‘right’ and unassailable. I see many of these anxieties and desire to be ‘right’ and unassailable, even many of the ways that the sense of justice comes forward, to be rooted in Christian notions and expressions. Indeed, the way language is deployed from a lot of these sectors tends to be echoing the ideas of sin and salvation without much of the grace or forgiveness. Well-meaning or not, as the saying goes, intent is not impact.
The problem with ideological purity, especially lacking compassion and attendant justice, is that making cultures is a messy thing. A cursory look at the history of Paganism and Heathenry in the milieu it comes from very clearly shows this. Without Wicca modern Heathenry would likely not exist as it does now. Without both the generally leftward pull of the Goddess movement, the more reactionary elements within broader Heathenry, and the pendulum swinging back again, The Troth and modern Heathenry would both be very different.
Likely, Heathenry more broadly without these influences in its past would likely be far more far-right politically, if not entirely a political animal, as desired by Else Christiansen and her ilk. Many of the broader trends since that have impacted the New Age communities and occult communities, given the early intersection, have also come in various forms to our own. There is no purity as such to be found, and the yearning nostalgia for a Golden Age past that never was has had more than enough time to be a driving force in Heathen and Pagan communities. The yearning for ideological purity is likewise toxic, corrosive to healthy communities and people, and produces an insidious performativity that gets in the way of genuine connection and community building.
So how is Heathenry developing cultures? One of the big ways is how folks choose, and then engage, with what I tend to call ‘home cultures’, the cultures that the Heathen is taking their cues from, such as Icelandic, Norwegian, or Aenglish. Another is by where they live. Taken together, many Heathens are approaching their particular Heathen ways in a dynamic, localized way that brings their local environment and the particular Heathen culture together in unique ways. Some folks, myself included, are incorporating as much language from the home culture as they are able, bringing it forward with new use and neologisms. These are the developing stages of culture.
If archaeology and investigation of what written sources remains to us have taught us anything about ancient Heathen cultures, it is that they were consistently in flux, changing, and were differently engaged with at different times, places, and circumstances. Whatever we solidly make now I expect will change over the long-term. Hell, even in the last twenty years I have seen a lot of Pagans go from not having much to do with Ancestors to actively worshipping the Ancestors become part of mainstream polytheist and animist communities. I would hope folks embrace this lack of certainty, no matter what traditions take root as a result of the work we have done and will do. This quote by Gustav Mahler sums up my idea here: “Tradition is not the worship of ashes, but the preservation of fire.”
Heathens need to be aware of how much responsibility we have in forming good relationships with our Ginnreginn and each other, and providing good soil for the next generation to grow from. What we take from and amend that soil with is what the next generation will have to grow with. What we grow today becomes part of the soil for ourselves and the generations to come.
With that in mind, what are some things I want to see Heathenry develop?
I want us to keep on developing local cultus. Local expressions that honor our Heathen Ginnreginn, and where we can, those Ginnreginn that were here well before us. I want us to keep on develop hearth cultus. Those Gods, Ancestors, and vættir that share our homes and our lives can develop unique ways of doing so, and those I think are as important to pass on as anything else. Of course we want to approach experiences with discernment, and so should developing our traditions. Once we have, though, I think it is important we share them so they live on beyond us. If they stop being relevant to later generations they can make the choice to stop engaging with those traditions. However, while we live, even if it is something as small as “We put the offerings on this side of the fire for this reason” or “Each Yule we bake a Yule log cake and set some aside for the húsvættir” those are still as valid and needed as something larger like “We celebrate Yule this way”.
How we conduct ourselves is a big part of how I exist as a Heathen. The ethical considerations for others, how those decisions are made, and how we act are part of what we are passing on in our Heathen traditions. If the Earth is a God, whether you understand the Earth as Ýmir and/or Jörð, and if the world is full of Ginnreginn, then how we conduct ourselves matters because we are consistently doing so with others. How do we live in the systems we are enmeshed in and do the best we are able for the Ginnreginn we share our lives with? What does an ethical consideration for the land we live on look like?
For me, it is doing as much as I can to reduce my consumption, to live well on the Earth, and give back to the land and waters that I live among. While I may not be able to convince my government to respect the personhood of the land and waters, I can still treat them this way, still develop good relationships with Them, and take care of my home accordingly. I can plant native plants, encourage the ones that are already here, not rake up and burn the leaves, and compost what we are able. As I find there may be more we can do, I do it.
What does respect, in and out of ritual, look like? For example, what is a respectful gesture of greeting and farewell? Do we bow? If so, do we bow just our head? How far? Does a deep incline mean something different from a slight nod, and if so, when is each appropriate? Do we kneel? If so, when, how, and why? If we do not kneel, prostrate, or otherwise show deference, why, what does it say about our relationship with the Being at hand, and how do we conduct ourselves?
In my own case I will generally offer a handshake to a physical person, or a small bow from my neck or shoulders. A nod, if less formal. I generally will hail my Gods, and bow from the waist before my Gods after touching my hands on the top of my forehead and my heart, a gesture to greet them in voice, body, mind, and souls. A deeper incline might be used if I or others have caused some kind of offense or I am righting a wrong in ritual, such as someone throwing trash into the Sacred Fire. If the offense was severe, I may genuflect or prostrate myself as both a show of deference and apology.
What does formal ritual wear look like, and how might this change with time of year and climate? If we have formal ritual wear, is there a certain way it must look, or material it must be made from? Why?
For myself, I really enjoy wearing linen clothes. It feels amazing on my skin, comfortable to wear year-round, and there is a satisfaction in wearing it for me. Much of my formal ritual wear is Viking Age, made of linen or cotton, and it tends to consist of a linen tunic, linen pants, a tablet-woven belt, and a linen or wool cap. If it is colder I may wear leg wrappings and a Klappenrock coat, such as this one. Besides enjoying the look and feel of these materials, I also feel a kind of bringing the older Ancestors with me through wearing these clothes.
Wider questions around ritual specialists, spiritual specialists, and roles in the community are also being worked out as we go. Much of my blog here reflects this, and likewise my other media such as Around Grandfather Fire, 3 Pagans on Tap, and my YouTube Channel. My hope is that over time we have less need for ritual and spiritual specialists having to wear administrative hats as well in our groups. It is one thing to be the goði of a small Kindred, Mímisbrunnr Kindred in my case, and a whole other things to serve a variety of community functions. Mercifully, this is already starting to become the norm, and I am so glad to see it. There is also the working out of “When does this require a spiritual specialist?” which has also been cool to be part of in a variety of ways. Sometimes folks do not need us, they just need to be point in a good direction and we happen to be there. Sometimes folks are dealing with things that need our experience.
My experience with this has been that there is such a counter-cultural independent streak present in so many Pagan religions that this is going to keep on getting hammered out in different ways in Heathen spaces. Some folks are going to keep on with the idea of everyone being their own priest and others are going to rely on spiritual specialists more. I think at least part of this attitude comes from Wiccan religions and Wiccan-adjacent communities which, given their emphasis on initiation and training, does not surprise me. I do not consider this a bad thing in and of itself. I think that self-reliance is a good and fine thing to cultivate, and likewise, so are specialists who have training and experience in particular topics. Not every situation needs a person to engage with a diviner or spiritworker. I would hope that learning spiritual discernment and basics of various forms of spiritual exploration is something that is encouraged regardless of Pagan religion. I would like the stigma and ultra-independence to lessen in our communities so folks feel no shame, and are in fact, encouraged in asking for help from a spiritual specialist, especially prior to things getting too overwhelming, intense, or frustrating that they have to ask for help.
I hope I live long enough to see Heathenry develop different ways of speech, dress, mannerisms, rituals, and ceremonies. I hope to see the Heathen communities bloom like a field of wildflowers, each taking up their ground in different, beautiful ways that expresses that Heathen community’s relationship with the Ginnreginn, their views, their environment, and their ways of life. I hope that Heathen communities get to share all of this with the folks they live with, and bring their beauty to their neighbors, their lives, and the places they live. I hope we, in turn, are receptive to our neighbors and those we live with.
I have hope for Heathen communities. I have hope that we can be beautiful, vibrant cultures that bring the depth, power, and passion wherever we are, with whomever we are with. I have hope that we are taking the lessons from the past, and bringing forth a new, exciting future, one which lives well with our Ginnreginn and one another, that co-creates new ways forward while being grounded here in Miðgarðr. I have hope that we are building vibrant, powerful, deep, and rich Heathen communities, religions, and cultures.
“Given the nature and frequency of this topic, I’d be curious to see your thoughts on the other side and what the gift you’re gifting for is or may be.”
I am glad Snow asked this, both because it got me thinking and because asking for things tends to be more emotionally charged and controversial than the giving of offerings. Part of this is due to how discussions are often framed around what we are making offerings for, why, and how. Part of the fraught nature of discussions on the asking for things in return for offerings given in polytheist circles is that one of the key assumptions many make is that gifts must be made selflessly, given without thought of return. While I do believe these have their place, this being the only or primarily accepted way of asking for gifting to the Gods severely limits how and what we may ask for.
To quickly recap, an offering is a gift made to a Ginnreginn, a God, Ancestor, or vaettr (spirit). An offering may be physical or nonphysical. An offering may be a gift of mead poured out at the base of a tree or at an altar, or it may be a service such as cleaning up a park. Sometimes this is done because the polytheist wishes to thank the Ginnreginn for help with something, or to ask for help in the future. Sometimes this is done because the polytheist wishes to be closer to the Ginnreginn and this offering is a way to honor that Ginnreginn. Sometimes an offering is made in anticipation or hope of an outcome, such as making an offering to be left alone by a group of Ginnreginn or to cultivate a closer tie. Whatever reason offerings are being made, I think it is better to think about them as continuing cycles of reciprocity rather than gifts as offerings, wholly selflessly made or they are somehow ‘corrupt’ or not good offerings.
Some offerings are made as a way of beginning or continuing a relationship between a polytheist and the Ginnreginn they worship, serve, or work with in some capacity. Some offerings are transactional in nature, meant to be a payment for services rendered or promised, information gathered, or some other reason as an exchange of things of value between a given Ginnreginn and a polytheist. Some offerings may be both of these things, a gift given that continues the relationship that also serves as payment.
Part of why I think that only giving selfless gifts does not work is partly based in why people historically made offerings to vaettir they wanted no contact with. Offerings of butter, bread, blood, etc were made because They left the giver alone. The cycle of reciprocity continued, in this case, a lack of contact or harm. Others were intentionally sought with offerings like these in mind. Another part of why I think that only giving selfless gifts does not work is because it limits the ability of the Ginnreginn to gift to you. It undoes reciprocity by locking the Ginnreginn out of the ability to be fully involved in the gifting cycle.
Polytheists have made offerings for time out of mind for Ginnreginn that they wished to keep appeased, at bay, or because of obligations with they hold to other Ginnreginn. When I began worshiping Odin, soon after He had me put my unease with Loki aside and insisted They be honored with offerings as well. When Odin had me begin a relationship with the Runevaettir where I intiated with Them, learning and working with Them, blood was and has been a fairly consist offering to Him as Runatyr and with Them. The reason for the offering of blood is twofold. First, it honors Him and His Sacrifice on the Tree, and second, it is payment for the ongoing work we do together for myself and for others. For the Runevaettir, it honors Them and Their existence, and it also is part of the ongoing payment of good reciprocity between us for the immense amount of work we do together, both for myself and for others.
The entire field of votive offerings would not exist if people did not expect to receive from the Ginnreginn that they offered to. Whether offerings of casts made of a person’s leg asking Aesclepius to heal it, small offerings of wine made by the graveside of the Ancestors for protection, or the deposition of a sword and twelve lance heads in thanks for victory in battle, historically, votive offerings have taken a great many shapes. Whether these votive offerings were made prior or after the reception of a gift from the Ginreginn, the intent of votive offerings is to be thankful and give for what is received from the Ginnreginn.
There is nothing morally wrong with asking for things from the Ginnreginn. It would be wrong, even approaching hubris, to try to compel a gift from a Ginnreginn through the gifting of an offering. Gifts need to be given in good Gebo, so reciprocity and hospitality are key, both when giving and in reception of the gifts. My view is that asking for things from the Ginnreginn is part of that good Gebo, and so, votive offerings and similar kinds of offerings, whether made before or after receiving a gift from the Ginreginn, are good things to do.
So what am I gifting for?
When it comes to offerings with my hearth Ginnreginn I am establishing and maintaining good Gebo, hospitality, and our relationships both individually and with the family as a whole. Some household offerings are made to ask the Ginnreginn to continue to bless our home with protection, wealth, wellness, and wisdom. Sometimes we make offerings for specific things, such as sheltering us through hard times, the death of loved ones, or to bring patience in frustration. Others are made to just say ‘Thank you’ and ‘We love you’.
When it comes to Ginnreginn such as Rúnatýr and the Runevættir, some of my offerings are in thanks and love, such as offerings of water, whiskey, mead, praise, or song. At least once a week I give anywhere from 3-9 drops of blood in offering as payment for Work we have done or will do. Sometimes I smoke tobacco and/or mugwort in offering, offering it and the time so that good communication flows between us, and to give the time of that smoking to Them and, often, to commune with Them.
When it comes to Ginnreginn I have honored through poetry, prayer, or song here, I often give offerings so that They will turn Their attention to me, and hopefully see fit to inspire me. I, in turn, hope to write, sing, and pray well for Them. Some of these offerings are specific ones I have been led to give to attract Their attention, such as when I have given red wine to An Mórrígan when a poem, prayer, or song was requested for Her.
I have made offerings for wellness when I am sick, for aid when I am under threat, and for calm when I am angry. I have made offerings for others in the same situations. It is not unreasonable to ask that the Ginnreginn pay attention our prayers and offerings. It would be unreasonable to ask for all of our prayers and hopes to be answered, as though the Ginnreginn were to be treated like vending machines that drop blessings and megin if we just put enough offerings in.
Asking the Ginnreginn for things in return for offerings means that the offerings, the prayers, and the act of us turning our attention towards Them is an invitation for Them to do the same. As we do not have the ideas of omnipotence, omniscience, or omnipresence as put down by Christian theology, and do not have the adjoining issues, we have to do some reaching out ourselves. Since I understand that Óðinn is not omniscient, as He is constantly collecting stories, information, and wisdom, then He made need to be made aware of what it is I want and need. While I do understand that our Gods very much can understand us where and when we are, I see that our portion of things, our obligation here, is to invite Their attention in effective ways. Offerings are one of those ways, as are prayers, rituals, and ceremonies. Our Ancestors do not become instantly enlightened on death, and Their wisdom, individually and collectively, can be found in that they’ve lived lives like ours, and understand, and in many ways may celebrate those limits in ways Gods or vættir may not or may not Themselves understand. Vættir may need to be intentionally invited through welcomes of offerings, prayer, ceremony, and ritual, opening up our space in a hospitable way that allows them to cross whatever the threshold at hand may be, whether our ritual space, home’s threshold, or to come into a shrine.
Asking the Ginnreginn for things is an act of balance, one that ensures we are not only giving. It keeps hospitality, both with regards to those sacred items we may care for and relationships we may carry, and in regards to ourselves as hosts being open to the contribution of our guests. Asking the Ginnreginn when we offer allows the relationship to flow well, to empower and enrich us both, and develops our bonds deeper, further, and, at times, tighter. It allows us to flourish and co-create Urðr together through the act of offering, the receiving of the offering, and the reception of our own gifts in kind.
Sarenth Odinsson 